Educational Media Reviews Online

Why is Harold T.P. Hayes, Esquire Magazine’s visionary Editor during the 1960s not as readily recognizable as his hero Harold Ross of the New Yorker, or even Diana Vreeland of Vogue? Perhaps it’s because he left the magazine in the early 1970s to pursue a different career or that he died fairly young in 1989. Alternately, it may be because he was the kind of editor who put his magazine first, preferring to have its content speak for itself. His relative anonymity vis-à-vis his immense status will surely change with the release of Smiling Through the Apocalypse: Esquire in the 60s, his son Tom Hayes’ fond look at his father’s great contributions to magazine publishing.

Piecing fragmented memories from colleagues with more personal recollections from his own youth, Hayes is able to do justice to the man described as “a cultural anthropologist functioning as a magazine editor.” During his tenure at Esquire, Harold Hayes brought together great writers to work for him during a remarkable period for magazine writing. Norman Mailer, Nora Ephron, Gay Talese, Gore Vidal, Tom Wolfe and many others were assigned to ground-breaking articles. Photographers of the calibre of Robert Frank and Diane Arbus contributed to the magazine. Perhaps Tom Hayes was inspired by his father’s 1970 Esquire anthology of the 1960s by the same name to bring forth the context to how those great articles were written. It would certainly be another way of honoring his father’s great talent as an editor and would indeed be a handy book to consult after watching this documentary since it contains most of the articles referred to in the film.

Harold Hayes was from North Carolina and brought a fresh eye to New York magazine publishing when he arrived. He worked at several small magazines before being hired as assistant to publisher Arnold Gingrich, who was also the founding editor of Esquire in 1933. Hayes came in at a time when the magazine was desperately trying to shed the vulgar “girlie” image it had acquired as a men’s magazine over twenty years. Hayes distinguished himself from other editors by taking risks. In 1961 he became Managing Editor and was then able to get full editorial control and dissolve the pinups and cartoons in favor of new directions in art and photography. Esquire was a large format color magazine which required three months to print, meaning that time-sensitive articles would only reach readers four or five months after they occurred. This necessitated extraordinary editorial commitment and Hayes forged through with literary and graphic innovations and unleashed devices that become known as “new journalism” where non-fiction reads more like a novella. He elicited satiric elements getting his art department to use a classical painting style. He created a funny “Dubious Achievement” section which sold magazines at times of the year when sales were stagnant. By 1963 when he became full Editor, the publication was a hotbed of experimentation and surprise.

Peter Bogdanovich reminisces about how his life was changed after he sent Hayes an article on film and Hayes gave him a job as a correspondent in California. Tom Wolfe recalls how he was assigned to profile Cassius Clay (later Muhammad Ali). Gay Talese recollects the problems he had and the time he spent getting his story on Frank Sinatra. The article “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” appeared in the April 1966 issue and is considered by many to be the finest magazine article ever published. In 1968, Hayes assigned William Burroughs, Jean Genet and Terry Southern to cover the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Their articles appeared months after the event yet their takes on what went on were innovative if not paradoxical. Accounts of Gloria Steinem’s rocky professional relationship with Harold Hayes are woven throughout the narrative with personal anecdotes from his son.

In 1973 Hayes was offered the Publisher’s position but without editorial control, so he left. He moved to work in television and wrote books on wildlife conservation. He was working on a book about Dian Fossey when he was diagnosed with a brain tumor. He died in 1989 and the book was posthumously published. Tom Hayes displays such touching affection and respect for his father as well as for this wonderful period in magazine publishing which brought together a formidable group of writers, artists and editors. This documentary is highly recommended for anyone interested in the literature and culture of the 1960s, the rise of feminism in the 1960s, the history of magazine publishing, and journalism in general.